Slumdog Millionaire is an often funny, sometimes sad but always fascinating story of one young man's determination to leave the slums behind and be with the girl he has always loved. It is easily the best film I have seen this year and I left the cinema today on a real high, knowing I had just watched something special. It is a long time since I enjoyed a film as much as I did this one and I cannot wait until it's proper release next month so that I can see it again.

The film is set in Mumbai, India and opens in with Jamal Malik, a product of the Mumbai slums, being interrogated by the police. He is suspected of cheating after successfully answering the penultimate question on the Hindi version of Who Wants to Be a Millionaire. Held overnight in the police cell he must convince his interrogators that he has not cheated and the film is played through flashbacks as Jamal tells the story of his life and how he knows all the answers.

What Danny Boyle has managed to do with this film is simply stunning, not once did anything feel contrived at all, the flashbacks worked well and he has really managed to give us a real India without any of the cliches that seem to litter recent attempts at films set in the country (Wes Anderson take note). Boyle never recreated the slums or the people to bring us this story, he worked with a local crew and local actors and shot right there amongst it all, and it really shows. I could not take my eyes from the screen, an early sequence of a young Jamal and his brother being chased through the slums by the police is remarkable filmmaking.

Some critics have called it Dickensian, maybe it is. It could be Oliver Twist for 2008, only swapping the slums of Victorian London for the slums of an emerging India. In fact the two are probably not too dissimilar. It does have a fairy-tale like quality to it, though I say that in a positive way. Nothing wrong with a straightly told tale when it is given to us in such a brilliant way, and this one certainly is.

I loved the music in the film, both the score and the songs from M.I.A. They just fitted so well and really helped bring many of the action scenes into life. In fact I love everything about this film, I am really glad I have seen it and it is films like this that remind me why I want to write films in the first place.

If you are going to see one movie in the run up to Christmas then do yourself a huge favour and see Slumdog Millionaire. I promise you will not be disappointed.

I am going to shamelessly bump this post, one because I love this movie and want people to go and see it. But mainly because the National Board of Review have just announced their annual best films of the year list and they have named Slumdog Millionaire as their film of the year.

This is really huge when you look at the movies it beat to win this award and considering that three months ago Slumdog did not even have a US distributer and was destined for a straight to DVD release in the states. I think that Slumdog is now guaranteed an Oscar nomination and to be honest looks like the front runner for the win. Not bad for a $15m budget British film with a totally unknown cast. This is fantastic for the British Film Industry and of course fantastic for the brilliant Danny Boyle.

Slumdog also shared the adapted screenplay award with Benjamin Button and Rav Patel got the breakthough performance by an actor.

Full list of awards here: http://www.nbrmp.org/awards/